Good source for spare OEM HD for W700

[schmidtj]

I have a W700 with a RAID1 320GB 7200RPM Harddrives.
I'd like to keep a spare HD "just in case".
Is there a recommended source for OEM New (not remanufactured)
HD's?

The P/N's are:

42T1124 OEM
42T1571 FRU

Thanks,
J

[QFoam]

Schmidtj, my strategy with RAIDs is to keep them under warranty as long as possible, so that it's the computer manufacturer who has to cough them up from their own stores if one fails. I'm assuming here that you bought them as a RAID from Lenovo with the machine.

But when one fails, the other one probably isn't far behind. That's because they're both the same model of drive, probably from the same production lot, and run under precisely the same conditions. So don't delay in replacement when one fails, but you'll probably end up replacing both of them in close succession anyway. In fact, if one fails, you might replace both just to be proactive. The computer manufacturer will just replace them one at a time if they're under warranty, unless they don't have the old model in stock, in which case they'll simply replace both.

So I wouldn't worry about trying to have a single spare on hand. If one fails and you have to replace it from your own pocket, hard drives are cheap, they only get larger and faster and take less power as time marches on, and it's not too expensive to image the working drive, replace both, then restore from the image.

[schmidtj]

Thanks,
I purchased the W700 last November and opted for the 3 year Depot service.
I'm just anal I think. I like redundancy which is why I got RAID1 direct from
Lenovo when I purchased the W700. I figured I 'd keep a spare on hand so if
one HD did fail I could swap it quickly, file a warrantee claim and keep that
drive as my new spare.
I was also concerned about going with a larger HD and then messing it up
trying to expand the partition being that it's RAID1. I wasn't sure if
programs like Partition Magic etc. are compatable with the Intel Matrix HD
RAID firmware.
If I were to purchase a larger HD spare today I don't know how to determine
if it's compatable. I looked and there are a zillion different SATA 7200RPM drives
so I have no clue which one I could use to swap out my existing 320GB ones.
Assuming I can expand the partition without loss of data.
J

[QFoam]

I don't think the depot service will be a factor, because Lenovo will just ship you the drive directly so that you can replace it yourself, which is really simple. And they'll send it fairly quickly, so I don't think time will be a factor.

W700 users have mixed and matched different models of drives in RAID1's before. In fact, that's how barrywohl managed to migrate from one model of drives in his RAID1 to a different model, so you might look up his posts about that if you're curious.

The older version of Acronis True Image I'm using requires some tinkering to work with RAIDs, at least from its boot disk, although they may have added the appropriate RAID support in the latest version (BTW, I only recommend using Acronis from it's boot CD). But look at Barry's posts. He worked out a way to do the migration without doing disk imaging. You might PM him if you have questions about it.

[QFoam]

BTW, even though you have a RAID1, make sure that you have a backup of your hard drive on external media. And verify that the backup on that media is valid. Always make two copies of any critical backup.

That's just in case your laptop is, heaven forbid, lost or stolen, or the machine breaks down and you have to send it in for service. Whenever sending your laptop in for service, you have to already have a backup of the hard drive, because its contents may be lost during servicing. Here's a good cautionary tale:

http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/W-Series-Th ... d-p/254629

You're obviously thinking ahead. So be sure to think ahead about that.

[schmidtj]

I am anal when it comes to things like this.
I have local backups, copies of local backups, and backups to a cloud backup provider (JungleDisk) and even there I backup twice since JungleDisk supports Amazon S3 and RackSpace Cloudfiles and their backends.

[awolfe63]

Pop out the drive and look at it or use device manager. It is probably a hitachi or WD. You can getting a matching spare 320GB for under $100 - you don't need a lenovo drive.

[schmidtj]

The Intel Matrix software reports them as:
Array_0000
Status: No active migrations
Hard Drive Data Cache Enabled: Yes
Size: 596.1 GB
Free Space: 0 GB
Number of Hard Drives: 2
Hard Drive Member 1: HITACHI HTS723232L9SA60
Hard Drive Member 2: HITACHI HTS723232L9SA60
Number of Volumes: 1
Volume Member 1: OEMRAID1

[roj1200]

But when one fails, the other one probably isn't far behind.

Absolutely correct! The first drive in my W700ds failed in April and the second failed in June!

While waiting for the new drive to be fixed, the computer ran fine but, of course, the Intel raid manager warned me about the faulty disk at every startup.

The good news is that replacing the drive is a very easy process -- except that I couldn't work out which bay held disk 0! Once the drive was in the correct bay, the array rebuilt itself and I didn't lose any data.

[QFoam]

Just curious, roj1200, which brand of drive came in the RAID? Thx.

[roj1200]

Just curious, roj1200, which brand of drive came in the RAID? Thx.

All four drives (2-old, 2-new) were made by Hitachi.